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LIVE REVIEWS

Baku Jazz Festival 2018

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Baku Jazz Festival Baku, Azerbaijan October 25-28, 2018 Stormy winds that you had to lean into to walk along the pavements had ripped the giant poster of the Baku Jazz Festival clean off the exterior wall of the Rotunda Jazz Club. Not for nothing is Baku nicknamed The City of Winds -a moniker derived from the ancient Persian name for the city, Bādkube, or 'pounding winds.' The cold Caspian Sea wind and the warm ...

LIVE REVIEWS

Joanna Pascale at Chris' Jazz Cafe

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Joanna Pascale Chris' Jazz Cafe Philadelphia, PA November 10, 2018 The content of this show came as a complete surprise to this reviewer. I expected vocalist Joanna Pascale, who is by now a Philadelphia legend, to sing a typical set of standards from the Great American Songbook. Instead, she blew everyone away with a set of Italian tunes that I usually hear in the background at a little coffee shop called Anthony's in South Philadelphia! ...

CD/LP/TRACK REVIEW

Cory Smythe: Circulate Susanna

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Cory Smythe tells stories. About stories. Specifically, a father's tales in the rural heartland of America; ingredients that a listener might assume had shaped Smythe's imagination in ways that go far beyond music. But like the Stephen Foster discs spinning on the gramophone as a tornado approaches, Smythe's nostalgic and inspirational world is liner-note fantasy. Nevertheless, on Circulate Susanna those flights of fancy have manifested themselves in a near-indescribable collection of compositions and improvisations. There are hints of western swing, ...

CD/LP/TRACK REVIEW

Wayne Wesley Johnson & Friends: Jazzamenco

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The well-traveled and now New Mexico-based guitarist Wayne Wesley Johnson pulls out all the stops on the generally engaging double-CD set Jazzamenco, using (at various times) no less than seven guest guitarists, saxophone, Latin percussion, pan flute, charango and Chinese pipa to amplify the rhythm section of keyboards, bass and drums (which is present and accounted for on an indeterminate number of the session's thirty tracks, fifteen on each disc). As the saying goes, with friends like these . . ...

RADIO

New Orleans Diaspora – Kid Ory and King Oliver

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In the last hour we listened to the first jazz recordings by the Original Dixieland Jazz Band in 1917 and the antecedents of the music. In this hour we will follow the diaspora of New Orleans musicians as they spread across the country bringing jazz with them. Playlist Host Intro 00:00 Kid Ory's Sunshine Orchestra “Society Blues" from Ory's Creole Trombone (Greatest Recordings 1922-1944) (ASV Living Era) 2:44 Kid Ory's Sunshine Orchestra “Ory's Creole Trombone" from Ory's ...

CD/LP/TRACK REVIEW

Francois Houle - Alexander Hawkins - Harris Eisenstadt: You Have Options

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The late co-founder of the Vancouver Jazz Festival, Ken Pickering, recommended British pianist Alexander Hawkins to consummate this trio featuring Canadians: drummer Harris Eisenstadt (drums) and clarinetist Francois Houle. And, based on the output of this exquisite studio set, it was a sound decision to align with the pianist, who for several years has performed with Eisenstadt in the Convergence Quartet. Houle's melodious lines occasionally adopt flotation-like aspects, as the trio executes staggered asynchronous grooves with quaint shifts ...

CD/LP/TRACK REVIEW

Alan Hall: Heroes, Saints and Clowns

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Ratatet, the sextet led by drummer Alan Hall, doesn't seem to quite fit into a musical box of any style or shape. One of the San Francisco Bay area's most respected musical performers and educators, Hall assembled this uniquely constructed ensemble from fragments of previous engagements: He previously played in a trio called Electreo with Paul Hanson (here on tenor sax and bassoon, acoustic and with electronic treatments) and Jeff Denson (on fretless electric and double acoustic bass). Hall and ...

CD/LP/TRACK REVIEW

Delta Saxophone Quartet: Bowie, Berlin & Beyond

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This first-rate UK-based saxophone quartet has been in existence since 1984, and it is celebrated for its thought-provoking reimagining of well-known works from progressive rock icons such as King Crimson on Crimson! (Basho Music, 2016), and a cunning slant on Soft Machine, Dedicated to You... But You Weren't Listening (Moonjune, 2007). Here, the musicians derive inspiration from David Bowie's Berlin years and the significance of his association with producer, composer and trailblazing ambient-electronic artist, Brian Eno. The immaculate ...

RADIO

Art Ensemble of Chicago, Federica Michisanti and other great new releases

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Sometime ago everybody kept saying that the CD was dead. Judging by the growing number of new records that keep coming out at an increasing pace, the CD is still alive and kicking! Intrestgingly, as the number of new jazz albums continues to grow, this has not been at the expense of the average quality of the new album. This week we'll go through a heap of spectacular new releases, with a special emphasis on albums featuring ...

GENIUS GUIDE TO JAZZ

Top 10 Moments in Jazz History

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10. In 1956, while in the throes of kicking his heroin addiction and late for a gig, Miles Davis picks up a small black snake that had wandered into his Missouri home and--thinking it is just a hallucination--mistakes for a clip-on tie. He completed the gig wearing the snake, which started a trend of Jazz musicians wearing skinny black ties that continues to this day. 9. The Buddie Petit New Orleans Jazz Band are performing in a poorly ...